Trial begins for ex-Hastings priest accused of abusing altar boy

By Stephen Montemayor
Star Tribune
May 20, 2015

http://www.startribune.com/trial-begins-for-ex-hastings-priest-accused-of-abusing-altar-boy/304394841/

Opening statements are scheduled to begin Wednesday in the Dakota County trial of a former Catholic priest charged in connection with repeated sexual abusing an altar boy in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Francis Hoefgen, 64, who has left the priesthood and lives in Columbia Heights, was charged last year with two counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct for allegedly abusing the boy, who was between 9 and 12 years old at the time.

The Dakota County attorney’s office said the crimes were committed while Hoefgen was a priest at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Catholic Church (formerly St. Boniface) in Hastings.

Hoefgen also has been sued under the 2013 Minnesota Child Victims Act, which opened a three-year window for the filing of lawsuits for decades-old child sex abuse claims. While dozens of Minnesota priests have since been accused of sexual misconduct, Hoefgen is one of the few to face criminal charges.

Hoefgen was assigned to St. Boniface in Hastings in 1985.

Before that, according to a lawsuit, he had admitted to Cold Spring police that he sexually abused a 17-year-old boy at St. Boniface in Cold Spring in 1983. He then spent six months at St. Luke Institute in Silver Spring, Md., for psychological treatment, but the case did not result in criminal charges.

The lawsuit filed in Dakota County by St. Paul attorney Jeff Anderson in November 2013 alleges that the institute, St. John’s Abbey and the Twin Cities archdiocese concealed Hoefgen’s past abuse and failed to warn parents in Hastings.